God is not on our side because he hates idiots also.

How can I be out of money if I still have checks left?!



Don't worry about the US credit rating. Alan Greenspan thinks we will never have any debt or default problem, because we can always print more money.



(On Meet the Press Sunday, August 7th)

I'm sorry, Dave. I'm afraid I can't do that.

I can longer put any fiscal confidence in the government.

"If the US Government was a family, they would be making $58,000 a year, they spend $75,000 a year, & are $327,000 in credit card debt. They are currently proposing BIG spending cuts to reduce their spending to $72,000 a year. These are the actual proportions of the federal budget & debt, reduced to a level that we can understand." ~Dave Ramsey

When you put your hand into a bunch of goo that a moment before was your best friend's face, you'll know what to do.

"Likewise, the church in our day is to be holy. The church is not a voluntary association to be governed as its members see fit, but a dwelling place of God. It ought to be structured according the orders of its commander, the Lord Jesus Christ. Our families and our homes are to reflect the spiritual purity, beauty, and orderliness that was temporarily pictured through the tabernacle and is now supremely set forth in Jesus Christ Himself."
~Vern Poythress, The Shadow of Christ in the Law of Moses

But, Vern ... and I hope it's okay to call you "Vern" ... methinks a big problem in the churches in the US of A is that they are seen as and operate as "a voluntary association to be governed as its members see fit."

Consequently, their families don't "reflect the spiritual purity, beauty, and orderliness" they ought. It may or may not be a uniquely American problem, but "We the people" is great for ordering a nation, but for a church it must be "You, the Lord, Jesus."

Is NASA Viable? Is ANY Federal Program Viable?

Opponents of space travel argue about NASA’s cost over-runs, that it is economically unviable, dangerous to human life, etc.

Not to justify financial waste by any means, it must be pointed out that there is not a single area of any government-run program that does not waste taxpayer money, in one way or another.

While the $18 billion NASA budget is huge, as a number, it is 0.6% of the federal budget, showing anyone that government expenditures, with a budget of approximately $3 trillion, are enormous.

By way of comparison, the National Institutes of Health are funded with about $30 billion while US military and economic foreign aid is around $45 billion.

When looking at ways to cut federal spending one must look at what is most alarming in budgets: earmarks.

Yes, Capitol Hill (Democrats, Independent and Republican alike), we have your number!

This excess pork represents monies inserted into other, larger, bills, that benefit only the constituents of an elected representative with no public vote and little to no oversight. During 2006, earmarks containing $29 billion in spending were inserted into larger, almost always, unrelated bills.

One report stated that in 2005 the figure was $48 billion contained in some 16,000 earmarks.

However, when comparing NASA to other programs (but especially earmarks) one must also consider that the secondary benefits of the Shuttle program are, in many areas, extremely beneficial to society and mankind.

Although it may be argued that some or even all of the technology spinoffs would eventually have been developed in the private sector, it is noted in NASA’s Spinoff journal that technology developed and utilized in the Space Shuttle program appear in the following areas: health and medicine; transportation; public safety; consumer goods; environmental management; computer technology; and industrial productivity.

A few of these shuttle spinoffs are: an implantable heart resynchronization device, an improved form of LASIK eye surgery, environmentally friendly lubricants, advanced fireproof insulations for a variety of vehicles, video-enhancing software, infrared cameras for detecting fires, insulation for homes and clothing, biodegradable pesticides, food production, and bar coding for inventory control.

Regardless of one’s political leanings, it can easily be argued, and proven, that the Space Shuttle program, and NASA in general, do provide citizens with incredible quality of life benefits.

Not all government-run agencies can make that claim. And ear marks? Not even worth discussing.

Hopefully, the elected men and women in Washington DC will see fit to go beyond the voices and opinions of special interest groups and actually fund projects that do, indeed, have positive benefit for all.

And they need to cease and desist all earmarking of legislation.

Over For Now.

Main Street One

The Preamble of the Declaration of Indpendence

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

Over For Now.

Main Street One

Your mom goes to college.

Folks in America often think of education as the panacea to cure all that ails a society. But is it? Or could it be used to the detriment of a society?

I heartily recommend the following lengthy video which questions the legitimacy of some assumptions in our society with regard to a college education. It also exposes the problem of indebtedness being necessary to getting an education, due to absurd costs.

Check out "The College Conspiracy."

• In related news, check out a SWAT team invasion being used by the Department of Education to collect on defaulted student loans. It's another incident raising concerns about the overuse of police force upon the American people and confirmation for me that the federal government should have NOTHING to do with education.

Really, check this stuff out, folks.

A Reminder

Just a quick post to remind Main Street USA what our political contributions and taxes support.

House In Session

Obviously this does not happen every day.

Or, at least, one hopes not.

Over For Now.

Main Street One

The people should not be afraid of their governments. Governments should be afraid of their people.

This day in 1835, the Texas revolution began in Gonzales after Texans refused to surrender the cannon. The American revolution began as a tax protest, the Texas revolution began as a gun control protest.

That should explain a great deal of unrest in our state & country.

The people should not be afraid of their government. The government should be afraid of its people. But, as dictators in the past have shown, an unarmed people are a controllable people.

"Firearms are second only to the Constitution in importance; they are the peoples’ liberty’s teeth." ~George Washington

The 2nd Amendment is not about the right to hunt, but about the right to protect and defend ourselves ... even and especially from the government. Somewhat tongue in cheek, it has been pointed out that the right to bear arms is the one right that ensures the government is faithful to honor all the others as well.

The mocking questions about hunters needing automatic weapons to shoot squirrels miss the point. The citizens need those weapons because the bad guys have those weapons ... and so does the government. I'm not advocating treason or militant rebellion, but that is how our country began and the ability to do that again, if ever necessary, was the motivation for the right to keep and bear arms, which should not be infringed.

In fact, a historical glance at the 2nd Amendment's genesis and that era shows that it was almost an obligation to bear arms in case needed for an uprising. Hence, an exception was in the early drafts that freed from obligation those with religious convictions from military service.

Let me speak frankly, you cannot count on the police to protect you. You might be able to depend on the justice system to prosecute those who commit violent crimes to your person, but you're tragically naive if you think the police, as awesome and as needed as they are, can protect you with (a) limited resources and (b) very defined constraints on what they may do.

"Today burglars fear the homeowner much more than the police. They know the police cannot shoot them for crimes against property and cannot chase them if they flee in a vehicle."
Read About It: The Knoxville News Sentinel (Tenn.)

"The world is filled with violence. Because criminals carry guns, we decent law-abiding citizens should also have guns. Otherwise they will win and the decent people will lose."
~ James Earl Jones

"Never Forget, even for an instant, that the one and only reason anybody has for taking your gun away is to make you weaker than he is, so he can do something to you that you wouldn't allow him to do if you were equipped to prevent it. This... goes for burglars, muggers, and rapists, and even more so for policemen, bureaucrats, and politicians."
~ Alexander Hope

"If gun laws in fact worked, the sponsors of this type of legislation should have no difficulty drawing upon long lists of examples of criminal acts reduced by such legislation. That they cannot do so after a century and a half of trying -- that they must sweep under the rug the southern attempts at gun control in the 1870-1910 period, the northeastern attempts in the 1920-1939 period, the attempts at both Federal and State levels in 1965-1976 -- establishes the repeated, complete and inevitable failure of gun laws to control serious crime."
~ Senator Orrin G. Hatch

"To ban guns because criminals use them is to tell the innocent and law-abiding that their rights and liberties depend not on their own conduct, but on the conduct of the guilty and the lawless, and that the law will permit them to have only such rights and liberties as the lawless will allow... For society does not control crime, ever, by forcing the law-abiding to accommodate themselves to the expected behavior of criminals. Society controls crime by forcing the criminals to accommodate themselves to the expected behavior of the law-abiding."
~ Jeff Snyder, author American Handgunner, Second Amendment Foundation Officer

"The biggest hypocrites on gun control are those who live in upscale developments with armed security guards -- and who want to keep other people from having guns to defend themselves. But what about lower-income people living in high-crime, inner city neighborhoods? Should such people be kept unarmed and helpless, so that limousine liberals can 'make a statement' by adding to the thousands of gun laws already on the books?"
~ Thomas Sowell

• Read more quotes regarding gun control or 101 of the Best Gun Quotes Ever or Good Gun Quotes, including thoughts of modern leaders and the founders' intentions.

Quotes To Think About

I would like to share certain of my favorite quotes from a variety of individuals. Some are serious, others are humorous but I believe that all of them are pertinent to life in one way or another.

They are in no particular order…

"And in the end, it's not the years in your life that count. It's the life in your years." Abraham Lincoln

"We must learn to live together as brothers or perish together as fools." Martin Luther King, Jr.

“Women and cats will do as they please, and men and dogs should relax and get used to the idea.” Robert A. Heinlein

"We must find time to stop and thank the people who make a difference in our lives." John F. Kennedy

“Real integrity is doing the right thing, knowing that nobody's going to know whether you did it or not.” Oprah Winfrey

"Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the universe." Albert Einstein

“The preservation of the means of knowledge among the lowest ranks is of more importance to the public than all the property of the rich men in the country.” John Adams

“Once you learn to read, you will be forever free.” Frederick Douglass

“There are no secrets to success. It is the result of preparation, hard work, and learning from failure.” Colin Powell

“A politician looks forward only to the next election. A statesman looks forward to the next generation.” Thomas Jefferson

“We do not have a money problem in America. We have a values and priorities problem.” Marian Wright Edelman

“Government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it.” Ronald Reagan

“The price good men pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men." Plato

“Education is a vaccine for violence.” Edward James Olmos

“Our greatest glory is not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall." Confucius

"The Constitution is not an instrument for the government to restrain the people, it is an instrument for the people to restrain the government - lest it come to dominate our lives and interests." Patrick Henry

“I've failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.” Michael Jordan

“It's the friends you can call up at 4 a.m. that matter.” Marlene Dietrich

Happy thinking!

Over For Now,

Main Street One